From 19 November, the Robert Walser Center in Bern presents an exhibition on Tilo Steireif’s interpretation of Robert Walser’s novel, The Robber. The Lausanne native depicts his perceptions through a series of 112 watercolor paintings. Published posthumously in 1972, the novel is considered a milestone of modernist literature.

Tilo Steireif produced his subtle yet spectacular interpretation of the novel between 2012 and 2013 in Berlin. It now appears on view to the public for the first time in this new exhibition at the Robert Walser Center. Steireif bluntly expresses the novel’s tendency toward transgression and the erosion of boundaries in his series of 112 watercolors, elevating Walser’s ambitiously realistic narrative into the realms of the fantastic without losing sight of the original.

From Fischli/Weiss and Markus Raetz back in the early days to the likes of Tacita Dean, Marie José Burki, Thomas Hirschhorn, Dora Garcia, Rosemarie Trockel, Rodney Graham, Mark Wallinger, and Thomas Schütte in more recent years, the sheer number of artists to have drawn inspiration from the life and works of Robert Walser shows the extent of his influence in the world of visual arts. With Tilo Steireif’s watercolor exhibition, the Robert Walser Center continues to address the effect of Walser’s work on the visual arts, already impressively documented in the Aargauer Kunsthaus’s 2014 exhibition dedicated to Robert Walser, Ohne Achtsamkeit beachte ich alles (Paying No Attention I Notice Everything).

Born in Lausanne in 1969, Tilo Steireif graduated from the École cantonale d’art de Lausanne (ECAL) and the Haute école d’art et de design de Genève (HEAD). Since 2000, he has presented his extensive and eclectic work in numerous solo and group exhibitions across Switzerland, both in the French-speaking part and in Biel/Bienne, Bern, Thun, and Winterthur, as well as in Paris, Milan, Berlin, Vienna, and Barcelona.

Vernissage on November 19, 2015 at 6 p.m.
Robert Walser-Zentrum, Marktgasse 45, 3011 Bern
There will be talks by Matthias Frehner, Director of the Museum of Fine Arts Bern, and Reto Sorg, Director of the Robert Walser Center.